An autonomous vehicle is a vehicle that is capable of sensing its environment and navigating with little or no user input. An autonomous vehicle senses its environment using sensing devices such as radar, lidar, image sensors, and the like. The autonomous vehicle system further uses information from global positioning systems (GPS) technology, navigation systems, vehicle-to-vehicle communication, vehicle-to-infrastructure technology, and/or drive-by-wire systems to navigate the vehicle.
Vehicle automation has been categorized into numerical automotive levels ranging from Zero, corresponding to no automation with full human control, to Five, corresponding to full automation with no human control. Various automated driver-assistance systems, such as cruise control, adaptive cruise control, and parking assistance systems correspond to lower automation levels, while true “driverless” vehicles correspond to higher automation levels.
Generally, autonomous vehicles employ a number of long-range and short-range sensors to sense the environment surrounding the autonomous vehicle. In certain instances, it may be desirable to have one or more of these sensors movable relative to the vehicle in order to obtain a larger field of view for the one or more sensors. Moreover, in certain applications, such as object tracking, it may be desirable to have a long-range sensor and a short-range sensor with overlapping field of views, such that the short-range sensor may begin tracking the object upon entry into the short-range sensor's field of view and vice versa.
Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a vehicle sensor mounting system that enables one or more long-range sensors and one or more short range sensors to articulate relative to the vehicle, environment or road network. It is also desirable to provide a vehicle sensor mounting system in which at least one long-range sensor has a field of view that overlaps with a field of view of a short-range sensor, such that an object tracked by the long-range sensor may be tracked by the short-range sensor upon entry into the field of view of the short range sensor and vice versa. Furthermore, other desirable features and characteristics of the present disclosure will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and the foregoing technical field and background.